School of Languages, Literature, Culture and Communication

LI4211 Phonetics Project

Surname OSullivan Module code: LI4211 First name Nicola ID number 12117633 Foreign language you selected for this project Spanish

Group (underline the correct option): 3A 3B 3C 3D 3E

Lecturer/s: Mairead Moriarty Deirdre Mulcahy Agnieszka Skrzypek Project title: Phonetics project Maximum length: two A-4 pages Submission date and time: Week 6, October 18, 6 p.m.

[for lecturer use only]

Grade:

Section 1: The language and language consultant

The language I have chosen to look at in this project is Spanish. Spanish is a Romance language and widely spoken throughout the world today. With three hundred and twenty nine million speakers, it is one of the largest languages in the world, second only to Mandarin. Spanish is an incredibly phonetic language and words are almost always pronounced exactly how theyre spelled, with each part of the word being clearly articulated (Spanish.about.com). English and Spanish have a lot of vocabulary similarities due to both languages deriving many of their words from Latin and Arabic. The old Spanish alphabet used to have twenty-nine letters (the extra letters being ch, ll and ) but the current alphabet simply has twenty-seven letters, with being the extra one. (Spanish.about.com, 2010). Spanish also has the inverted question mark () and the inverted exclamation point (), both of which are unique to this language. My language consultant was a twenty-eight year old woman named Laura from Spain, who is studying in Ireland for a semester. She grew up in Valencia. Apart from Spanish, she also speaks Valencian fluently and began learning English at the age of 10.

Section 2: The language task

The words and sounds I have chosen to learn are: Valncia, Hermano, Llama, Finca and Universo.

Chosen Words Valncia Hermano Llama Finca Universo

My First Recording /vlnsi/ /hrmnu/ /ijm/ /fnk/ /ynevrso/

Lauras Recording /blnsi/ /rmno/ /jm/ /fink/ /unevrso/

My Second Recording /blnsi/ /rmno/ /jm/ /fink/ /unevrso/

Vowels and Consonants V: Voiced, Bilateral place of articulation, Occlusive manner of articulation. H: Voiceless, Glottal place of articulation, Fricative manner of articulation. Ll: Voiced, Palatal place of articulation, Fricative manner of articulation. I: A close front unrounded rowel. U: A close back rounded vowel.

Section 3: What you have learned

I found this project really helped me gain a broader and deeper understanding of the Spanish language. Having only recently begun learning the language, there was a lot I didnt know about it and it was intriguing to find out about some of its history and how the language as a whole is structured. The project was certainly beneficial and I feel that I can use my newly gained knowledge as I move forward with my studies. Before carrying out this project, I was struggling with some of the sounds in Spanish and unsure of how to correctly articulate certain words. By researching the consonants and vowels I was able to further understand how I should be going about pronouncing certain sounds and how they were different to English sounds. Figuring out details such as the place or manner of articulation of the sounds helped me to say them better each time I practiced. Conversing with a native speaker was the best and most helpful part of this project. It was extremely useful to hear a fluent speaker say the words until I got understood them completely. From speaking to my language consultant, I was able to learn how to pronounce my chosen sounds correctly which I can now apply to any Spanish words with these sounds, as its a very consistent language. Another advantage of working with a native speaker is that it helped me to improve on my Spanish accent which is important when trying to pronounce unfamiliar sounds.

Reference List 10 Facts About the Spanish Language (2012), Gerald Erichsen, viewed November 8th 2012, http://spanish.about.com/od/historyofspanish/a/10_facts_about_spanish.htm Two Letters Dropped From Spanish Alphabet (2010), Gerald Erichsen, viewed November 8th 2012 http://spanish.about.com/b/2010/11/29/two-letters-dropped-from-spanish-alphabet.htm